Representing War: Cultural Histories of the First World War in Australia and New Zealand, 2013–2020

Abstract

The centenary of the First World War (2014-2019) expanded and reinvigorated the historiography of this conflict. In particular, the war's cultural legacy generated an outpouring of publications between 2013 and 2020 that re-evaluated its traditional cultural representations and explored fresh avenues of inquiry through analysing contemporary interpretations of the conflict in films, books and television series. In this way, the centenary afforded historians the chance to engage in a broad conversation about the significance of the cultural history and, notably, memory of the war in an unprecedented way. This article explores the development of recent scholarship on representations of the First World War in Australia and New Zealand, exploring how this body of work not only refreshed the field but also shaped and extended understandings of the war's commemorative and cultural legacy.